


Clue

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, But Wait There's More!, Drunken Shenanigans, Drunkenness, Hangover, Humor, Impala, M/M, Motel, Mystery, Naked Dean, One Night Stands, Samulet, auto shop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-21
Updated: 2016-04-21
Packaged: 2018-06-03 13:54:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6613210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Dean's set on a man hunt for not one, but two of his prized possessions. Three, if you count the man who's putting him up to it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clue

Dean jolts awake with a hammer pounding heavy on his heart. His eyes are no better—once a 20-karat emerald stone now a kaleidoscope of colors, constantly pulling him forward like a never-ending carousal. 

The headache and the post-pleasure nausea he can handle. It’s when he does a full-body check with sweaty palms does he feel truly sick.

Despite being completely commando, he feels lighter somehow, which can only mean—

His amulet is gone.

Great. His brother gave him that. It’s not special because his brother's dead or something—he's not a morbid son of a bitch, but even so. It's like a photograph or a promise ring dredged up long since settling down with Ranger Rick and three photocopies of his little synchronized swimmers: It's sentimental. And now, the only thing he has to his name aside from a slew of curse words he loses like a Washington in a slot machine (or all the bile he’s about to gift his toilet).

He happens to cast a glance outside his window to the sight of _not_ his 1967 Chevy Impala in the parking garage.

Okay, definitely freaking out.

Scrambling from his sheets, he hops—scratch that, _plots—_ towards the bathroom. Watching a stream of mind-numbingly warm water and _Olay_ soap pass through the four dead-end trajectories between his fingers, he notices it: the number scribbled on the back of his right hand.

Two things he knows for certain (notwithstanding the ever-changing fact that Bert and Ernie are gay): It’s not anyone’s he knows, and even if it is, he’s not left-handed.

No, this handwriting is neater than anyone’s he’s ever seen, like whoever wrote it spent years studying the back of Dean’s hand and plugged in a scientific equation to measure how much pressure to put on his skin to get it _that_ immaculate.

But purple ink? Really?

Dean’s half-tempted to scrub it off and go back to sleep. Maybe even just the latter.

But then the cell he may or may not have lunged for in his back pocket is already ringing, and he wouldn’t want to bother someone for no reason.

“ _Hello?”_

***

Dean barely passes through the saloon-style entrance of Benny’s Bar & Grill, the number in question, which only raises more questions when the bartender,  a middle-aged man with a sugar and brown spice beard, predominant pale cheekbones, and a figure fit to sponsor Brawny, whistles, “Never thought I’d see you back here so soon, Chief.”

“Who?” Dean swivels his head like an old shopping cart around him. “Me?”

The bartender chuckles, still glazing the counter with a wet rag, “Unless there’s someone else I’m not seein’ that walks into a bar at ten in the mornin’.”

“Oh, uh, no, I guess not,” Dean laughs, approaching the counter. “I’m actually looking for something I might have left here—an amulet. It’s imitation gold. Mesopotamian, I think.  My car’s also missing. 1967 Chevy, black—the thing purrs like a dream. Maybe you can help me, uh…” Dean tries mentally drawing the bartender’s name from a Pilgrim hat, but comes up short, to say the least.

“Benny,” the bartender offers, light blue eyes crinkling in amusement as he lends out his right hand, fingers spread and palm upturned. A flash of heat hits Dean’s chest dead-on like a breakaway bullet: _Red._  He tries to process the reaction, but Benny’s saying, “And I know who you’re looking for.”

“I’m sorry, _who_ I’m looking for _?_ ” Dean asks.

Benny nods. “I don’t know about a necklace, but he seemed like he knew somethin’. Can’t say for sure, though, he didn’t stay too long, what with the parking fee and all. After 12am, you gotta pay.”

"He? Alright,” Dean says, reaching blindly in his back pockets for his wallet, “how much?"

"He told me you'd try that."

"How much is he paying you? I'll triple it."

"You really didn't think to check that thing before you came here, did you brotha?"

Dean freezes, then, slowly and charily pries the side of his wallet open. Not only is it devoid of cash, but there’s something tucked loosely inside one of the few folds.

***

“Yeapperoni, that’s me!” the assistant manager, Garth, replies, handing Dean back his business card. He’s the polar opposite of Benny, to say the least: tall and skinny, but awfully chirpy. “Bobby’s the one in charge here at Singer’s Auto, though, if you want to talk to him instead—”

“Oh no, I actually… I’m looking for someone…I guess,” Dean replies, sliding his wallet into his denim.

Between the sun’s blinding bulb and Dean’s statement, Garth’s child-like face curls. “You guess?”

“I mean, I’m actually looking for a _lot_ of things but—oh my God.”

“What?”

Dean’s heart speedometer jacks to the right, qualifying him for NASCAR. The bar, the auto shop—“You didn’t happen to have checked in a ‘67 Chevy Impala recently, right?”

Garth’s expression doesn’t change. “Uh, no,” he says carefully, like Dean’s glass and he’s going to break him if he says something in the wrong pitch. “We did just receive a ‘78 Continental last night, though. Looks like the thing went through literal hell and back. Although…”

“What?”

“Strangest thing, Bobby said the idjit owner dropped it off and sped off in a black Chevy. Rare gem. He said it was pretty dark outside, but might put it at a ’67. We’re right next to the pub, so it’s likely they were drunkards getting their _Fast & Furious _on. It’s great for business, though.”

Dean doesn’t blink. In fact, he doesn’t do anything for a solid minute, because another succinct shock wave ripples through him, this one traveling to a more… pleasurable body part.

Garth shifts awkwardly. “You okay, buddy?”

“Did Bobby say where it went?”

“Uh, yeah. Off the highway, toward _Motel 6_.”

***

Of course Dean chooses the place that wins consecutive _Most Likely to Get Your Car Stolen_ to park his car (to be fair, his penis chose for him), but nonetheless, relief the size of a tsunami washes over him when he jogs towards the sight of his prized car sitting in the parking lot. Just like he did to himself earlier, he does a full-body check. No kinks, no scratches, no evidence of damage—nothing.

Dean’s half-tempted to flood Kansas out of pure, unadulterated joy.

Still, that leaves one thing to mystery.

Dean walks into the _Motel 6_ , avoiding direct contact with anything beyond the handle. (It’s one thing to have a stranger’s bodily fluids on you from the night before, but it’s something totally different when it’s an _unwanted_ stranger’s bodily fluids.)

The girl behind the counter strikes his eye. With cars on his mind, she reminds him of a Prius: compact, but cute. Her long brown hair flounces over Johnny, Joey, Deedee, and Tommy as Dean nears her, eyes covered by black rectangular frames. The cheap and rusting nameplate next to her reads _Pamela._

“Room for one? That’s rare around here.”

Dean laughs, “I’m, uh, no. I’m actually looking for a man.”

“Aren’t we all,” Pamela says wistfully.

“No, I mean I’m actually—” Dean pauses, eyebrows quirking as he mulls that statement over. “Nah, there isn’t a better way to put that. Look, um, did I by chance stop by here last night with someone? That’s my car outside. The timestamp would’ve been around 11pm.”

Pamela’s face slides into an easy smile. “Ah, you’re Dean.” A moment later, she disappears, bending down to retrieve something from one of the cubbies behind her.

Dean noticing the Celtic tramp stamp dedicated to “Jesse” is purely accidental.

When she pops up again, it’s with a set of keys. “He told me these belong to you.”

“Thank you, you’ve been a…” Dean’s eyes stray south, “ _big_ help.”

***

The last clue is tucked inside his rearview mirror, disguised as a piece of motel-flavored mint chocolate candy. Inside the wrapping is a dollar bill folded into a neat little square. Opening it to reveal the side of the Illuminati, he reads (in purple fucking pen):

_Finally. What took you so long?_

_Now that we're both sober enough to drive: The Blazing Brew. Be there or be, dare I say, square._

***

“I remember you,” Dean says, approaching the oiliest table next to the window, “I went to the bar after a blowout with my brother, hoping to find some sort of relief from everything. Then I saw you. We had more than a few drinks.

You had your car parked outside. In our drunken stupors, I decided you should drive. We ran a red light and crashed into something big, nearly totaling the car. You dropped it off at the auto shop while I went and grabbed mine I had parked on the side of the road to avoid a charge.

I got us to Motel 6 by a miracle, where we finally sealed the deal. Everything’s gumdrops and rainbows from there for _me,_ but I’m presuming you woke up slightly more sobered and stole my keys to avoid another disaster, forcing me to stagger back home in the middle of the night. Naked, I’m guessing, since that’s how I woke up—something I presume you got full enjoyment out of.

What I still don’t know is why you stole my amulet.”

The man opposite him leans forward, allowing light to spill on his brown shock of hair. The _V_ of his white blouse opens too, exposing a thin trail of chest hair as he folds his tanned slender hands in a business-like way. The bottom lids of his eyes, dark blue as the night that enabled them, curve into a smile to imitate his plush pink and lightly stubble mouth as he hands him the necklace. “I needed a reason for you to see me again.”

“You wanna keep doing this?” Dean asks, warily reclaiming what’s rightfully his.

The way he says it, shrugging and leaning back in his chair, has Dean chuckling, “I wouldn’t mind it.”

“Castiel Novak, you are one strange dude.”

“I’ve been told. So,” Cas says once their coffees arrive, “what do you wanna do after this?”

Dean smiles wickedly against his Espresso. “I would give you a clue, but it’s a little too obvious.”


End file.
